Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Breaking Bad: Jesse and Jane Part 2

It all starts because Jesse's having a crap day. And when Jesse has a crap day, he turns to illegal substances. He tells Jane to get out because he's going to smoke some meth. He doesn't want to screw her sobriety. But she likes him and she likes drugs and the combination is not a temptation she can resist. Except Jane would rather do it up right. She brings home the serious shit and teaches Jesse how to shoot heroin.

Jane spirals fast. As someone who's hit bottom before, it doesn't take her long to find her way back. There's one heartbreaking scene between Jane and her father. She pleads and begs and bargains and does all the things television doctors and experts tell you addicts do. And it's such a far cry from the cool, confident girl she is when she's sober. For the fiftieth time: Poor Jane. As silly as it may sound, Jesse's far better at being a functioning addict. So yay! Something he can be proud of!

It doesn't really matter that Jesse's better at functioning because he's still super submissive. Like - ALWAYS. Jane wants them to wrestle Jesse's money away from Walt so that's what they do. Jesse feels bad about it, (because he's submissive to Walt too), but the sex is better with Jane so he goes with her plan.

Of course things go terribly terribly wrong. And by things I mean Walt. Walt goes terribly terribly wrong. Jane's death is such a convoluted twisty awesomeness of ethical questions. Because letting someone die is bad. I think we can all agree on that. But - is there a case to be made that if Jane lives, Jesse will be dragged down? It's a thin case, I grant you. The normal good human thing to do is call an ambulance and get help for all drug addicts involved. But then Walt wouldn't be so morally ambiguous and he'd probably win fewer Emmys. At least he shed a tear as Jane vomit-coughed through her last moments on earth.

And then Aaron Paul goes out and acts his freaking face off. THIS GUY, man. He's got one of the most subtly expressive faces in the history of faces. If there were an award for giving best face, I'd give it to him. I really do hate that Jane dies, mostly because it rips Jesse apart. Don't get me wrong - it's great television. But it's depressing television. And Jesse deserves good things because he's such a good guy. But he only ever gets shit on. Because he's also a weak guy. Sigh.

Jesse crawls off to a drug den to die. And he probably would have except Walt goes in after him. His motives are unclear - as always - but it's at least partially because he cares about Jesse, right? I mean, it's hard to tell if Walt really cares about anything anymore. I know I'm looking at season two Walt with my season five Walt glasses on, but he's never really been a shining beacon of selflessness. Whatever. Jesse needed a hug and Walt let himself be hugged.

I would have hugged him too. And so ends the colossally depressing story of Jesse and Jane. I'm a little worried Jesse's whole story will turn out to be colossally depressing, but I also have hope that people love hope. It might be naive of me, but I like the message it sends to have Jesse to survive the bleak landscape of this show. Fingers crossed that he gets good things.